Today we planned to explore the southern part of the island. The weather forecast was the same as yesterday, possible showers and thunderstorms. We saw dark clouds but didn’t experience any rain. We headed to the very tip of the island. It is clear that the southern half is less developed than the northern portion. We had lots of excitement but no cute harbors like yesterday. While the roads in the north aren’t great they are generally better that those in the south. Here’s our route for today (the stops are in order, A=Benitses, etc.)
On our way to the southern tip we stopped in a little town called Benitses. We walked around the town a little after a coffee for Rick and a fresh squeezed OJ for me.
We got to the very end and found a little anchorage with fishing boats.
We continued past the anchorage on this VERY narrow road on the edge of a cliff. The road forked and the left fork was a dirt road that had clearly been rained out. It had ruts so big that it was impassable, so we took the right fork. We continued around the corner about 1/4 mile and then the road just stopped. There was a significant drop to the beach below. Going forward was not an option and turning around was not an option so Rick had to back up about a 1/4 of a mile to the fork where he was able to back in a little way and turn around. YIKES!
After that we drove through an olive forest to Lefkimmi Bay which was pretty but really undeveloped. Here are pictures of the trees (I don’t know why the trunks look the way they do) and the bay.
By this time we were hungry for lunch so we headed towards Notos. We found a restaurant there and had a good lunch.
After lunch we went down to the restaurant’s beach area.
Fortified, we drove to a marina that we saw from the restaurant‘s beach. It was on the next little peninsula. We talked to a guy who had a 48ft beneteau sailboat (very similar to the one we are renting in Athens). He spent an hour with us talking about the boat and his experiences.
The next stop was Chlomos which is one of the oldest villages in Corfu (built around the 13th century) and one of the most picturesque in the whole island. We arrived in Chlomos and were following google maps and not really looking at the signs. We missed the sign that said we couldn’t drive into Chlomos; Google doesn’t seem to know that you can’t drive there. The road was getting narrower and narrower until finally it was too narrow for our car. Again we couldn’t go forward and couldn’t turn around so Rick had to back up the car uphill for about an eighth of a mile. We had a bunch of tourists and locals watching. They applauded when he finally made it up the hill. Rick did a great job and there was no damage to the car, but the clutch will never be the same.
We didn’t stick around so I have just a few pictures that I took while Rick consulted with the local on how to get the car turned around. Here are the pictures I managed to take.
Our last stop of the day was at The Governor’s Olive Oil Company. We were hoping to get a tour but they had a seminar starting in an hour. However they explained what makes an olive oil good and how to taste it. It is the polyphenols that give the olive oil its anti-inflammatory and anti-oxidant properties and their olive oil has much more than your average olive oil. That is because they harvest the olives early in the season and because they process them within three hours of picking them. We learned that when tasting you first warm up oil in your hands. Then you smell it. If it’s good oil you should sense an aroma of flowers or fruit. When tasting it you move it around your mouth for about 5 seconds. Then you suck air in through your teeth and swallow it. It’s interesting because at first you taste the flowery, fruity elements on your tongue, then you taste the bitterness in the back of you throat, and finally you taste the spiciness of the oil as you swallow it. We bought some of their olive oil to take home. Since we often eat salad with oil and balsamic vinegar, it seems we’ll invest in something better than the $2.00 Market Basket vinegar we have on hand to compliment this better than average olive oil.
From there we came back to the apartment and had a light dinner.
A couple of other things I have noticed about Corfu.
- They have a real trash problem. The British couple we met the other day said that they had a dump that got completely filled up four years ago and have not yet identified a new site. We certainly aren’t seeing four years of trash, but there are overflowing trash bins along the roads everywhere. They also seem to have a problem with too many cats. There are a lot of cats and I’m sure most of them are not fixed so they will continue to have a lot of new cats.
- It feels like Corfu has an aging population. We see a lot of older people in the little villages that we pass through. We are guessing that the only jobs here are associated with tourism and many of the younger generation have gone to the mainland to find work. Not an isolated issue from our experience traveling, but one that certainly saps the vibrance and innovative spirit within a society.